Before & After & Inbetween

Today, I refused buying a book I truly wish to read because it isn't available in ebook format. It's the first time, I consequently stopped further overloading my bursting shelves.

I am willing and able to deal with all - except the content-crippling forms (!) - of current DRM (Amazon, Adobe *BLECH*, watermarks...) in order to get to read a book I want.

I obtained books from Smashwords (sadly their paying system no longer plays with my credit card institute), Amazon.de, Thalia.de,... even Google Books (albeit mostly collecting their freebies, as I do with Google music and video ;-) ) without batting an eyelash, but paper-only these days means hauling 800 pages of dead weight on to my daily commute *or* only reading on weekends instead of writing, both "features" tend to result in the book not being read at all ( = wasted money), in addition to having to find shelf space for it.

So, Martin Schemm's book got relocated from my "check for reading" list to "hardware only / not worth it". For a bookoholic like me, that's a sad event!

Brent Weeks's The Black Prism comes with a strong, character driven plot, sound and realistic character building not only of the hero(es) but also of the secondary characters, and a complex world building centered around a refreshing novel kind of magic based upon the colors of the visual and near-visual light spectrum, which is not only consistently used but also consistently limited.

( More information (no spoilers): )

It's progressing.
Subaru's finally going to get visited in Imonoyama's bathroom.
At least, I hope that this weekend will be supportive towards my writing ambitions!

On the plus side: I finally found a second-hand issue of the official English translation of Albert Camus' "Caligula" on Amazon Marketplace. Yes, I'll cough up 1,95€ to get the official translation for that quote at the end of the fic. I'm that anal-retentive when it comes to the Decagram!

Stay tuned. And be afraid for that bathroom.

A couple of posts about the tv series Game of Thrones have sprung up across my friends lists in the last couple of days, probably caused by the dvd release of season 1 in Germany and the airing of season 2 (?).
I've followed the posts closely and - so far - I've come to the conclusion that Game of Thrones is one of those fandoms, which I will avoid because I love the books and the tv show, and find its grisly depictions entirely befitting the source. (I only mourn that the direwolves didn't get as much attention as I'd wished for them).

( continuation of why )

Edit: Not all comments I got here are without spoilers, though. :/

Assassin's Curse is a tough, short-paced short story adventure of the center pair of Lindsay Buroker's captivating The Emperor's Edge novel series. Fans of the series, especially A+S shippers, would not want to miss it! At least, I for sure loved every minute of reading it. :-)

Then why only 4 of 5 stars?
It's because Assassin's Curse suffers from a typical "established series in between short story illness": the indecision of whether to include all the details necessary for freshly visiting readers or to accept that it is an inbetween story catering to established fans and leave out the established background where it doesn't connect to the actual plot.
The result of this indecision are "info dumps" esp. in the first part of the story that are not enough for new readers to appreciate the characters (and their treats & quirks), while tempting an established fan to jump a few lines. Interestingly, the later part of the story doesn't suffer from this. Background details here (the supposed lineage of the current emperor, for example) are used skillfully as plot device and are also expanded to greater depth. Lovely so, I may add.

So much about style, but what about content?
It's not even 12.000 words, read yourself!
No really, I don't want to summarize a short story. It would give too much away imho. However, since only two of the five main characters star in this, I think it might be nice to have the other three say their thoughts about the events:

"Following heavily armed thieves onto a cursed island is not prudent." ~ Books.

"There's something wrong with a man, when it takes a shot to the back to make him hug a beautiful woman." ~ Maldynado.

"Whatever." ~Akstyr.

~~~

You can find Assassin's Curse here on Smashwords for example.

I Just finished Neil MacGregor's A History of the World in 100 Objects, ranging from the 2 million years old stone chopping tool to a contemporary credit card and a solar lamp (with charger).
This is easily the most entertaining - and enlightening - book on global history out there (global in the true sense of the word; though I miss Greenland and Antarctica)! I highly recommend investing your time in it. :-)

current frontline: page 165/208
within Interregnum 6.

Yes, you read that right. I'm still at page 165 in Interregnum 6, but the Family Matters pdf has now a page more.
The closure of the Akiko thread (a mere 280+ words) just didn't work the way it was presented originally. So I went back and rewrote it from scratch (give or take a few snippets of the original version and some lines from alternatives still in the scene dump). It's now 379 words long (and hopefully a lot clearer as to Akiko's motivations and personality).

...and I meant to write this three days ago, but was seriously distracted by the continuation of Lindsay Buroker's steampunk series The Emperor's Edge, followed by Maljean Brooks' The Iron Duke (no review, I read the German translation), and Brent Weeks' The Black Prism (captivating so far, but not sure it'll last. I loved his Night Angel trilogy in the beginning as well, but lost interest near the end of book 1. We'll see where the Prism is going. However, given that I hate garlic (the assassin's muncheon of choice) and love colors (the manifestation weapons in Prism), it's entirely possible that the Prism will have a different fate in my eyes.)

...have to stop, am writing parenthesized sentences (a.k.a. "word formulas") again. Until next post.

Lindsay Buroker's series "The Emperor's Edge" currently consists of two novels - The Emperor's Edge and Dark Currents (both slightly above 100.000 words) and a set of short stories (Ice Cracker II and others; ~19.000 words altogether) taking place in between.
I've read Dark Currents together with its direct prequel The Emperor's Edge and a related short story collection Ice Cracker II in one go this weekend. This series is a fast-paced, character-driven page-turner one shouldn't start reading with major deadlines within the next three days, because it will grab you and not let go until you drop off its (hopefully only temporary) end.

The imaginative - and neatly anal-retentive - female (former) police officer Amaranthe and the taciturn, mono-if not no-syllabic (not-quite-former) assassin Sicarius (yes, the one from Encrypted, but as a grown man now!) are an irresistible composition.

The setting is a refreshing genre mix with elements of steampunk, cop story, military and fantasy rolled into one to form an utterly compelling, self-carrying world that reminds as much of 19th Century London as of 19th Century Moscow.
Language and the style of the story-telling remind me of Lois McMaster-Bujold's early Barrayar books (most notably Shards of Honor), but the dry wit & humor shown by the well-defined characters are utterly unique and not to be missed.

I hope this series continues soon (though I would love seeing Encrypted, which plays in the same universe but 25 years earlier, continued as well. I recommended it earlier here.

Note: Lindsay Buroker's books are available as ebooks from various sources - including Amazon and Barnes & Noble. The links in the text above all go to the respective pages on Smashwords, my preferred source for indie ebooks. :)

This is a copy of the review for M. R. Mathias' "The Sword and the Dragon" I posted on Smashwords today.

The Sword and the Dragon was actually the first "indie ebook" I've purchased so far, mostly because of Liviu Suciu's review on fantasy book critic. After going through the extensive preview, I just had to know how the story continues, even though I had very little daytime on my hands to actually do so.
The Sword and the Dragon is high, epic fantasy with a full set of characters and locations. The plot is complex and truly addictive - in fact, I found myself hooked after going through the first third of the free preview - and certainly doesn't pull its punches when it comes to events. Plot and details are easily remembered, making it a perfect read when you are forced to take longer breaks from the text. Nevertheless, tension and pace are well held over its full length, despite its impressive word count, and the text itself is very easy to read.
However, there are occasional spelling and grammar mistakes and some of the scenes would have benefit a lot from a slightly more complex (or advanced) wording, but I'm known to "love big words", so don't let that turn you away from this book. I'm certainly going to read the next installment of this series.

You can get the book (or read an extensive free intro) here at Smashwords.

taken from jeldi.

The rules:
1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to the page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the next 4-7 sentences to LJ along with these instructions.
5. Don't you dare dig for that "cool" or "intellectual" book in your closet! I know you were thinking about it! Just pick up whatever is closest.

The result:

Cade stood calmly. The big man was an inert lump on the pavement outside. Her wail died away almost comically. There was only the sound of the broken glass falling out of its frame.
The receptionist huddled against the door.
"I'll call the police," she said, nearly shrieking.

Book: Christopher Farnsworth, "Blood Oath - the President's Vampire", ISBN 978-0-399-15667-0

...and I would like to add that the book is a lot better than the single excerpt above suggests. It's a rapid moving, imaginative combination of terror thriller and paranormal (vampire & co) action novel that proved to be a very delightful read after years and years of the vampire genre being repeated and soft-rinsed, creme-colored (and finally sparkly!) vampire books. This is tough, fast paced, breathless and decidedly unsparkly! I love it.